Even a Things-to-Do List Seems to Be Multitasking

I Don't Know How She Does It

Sarah Jessica Parker's character in “I Don't Know How She Does It” tries hard to juggle work and family (and lice).Credit
Craig Blankenhorn/Weinstein Company

The curse of Carrie Bradshaw infects “I Don’t Know How She Does It” with a severe case of what might be called post-Carrie Parkeritis. Parkeritis, if you haven’t heard, is the term given to a new ailment named after Sarah Jessica Parker, in which a star finds herself condemned to eke out the last drops of freshness from the role (in this case in “Sex and the City”) that made her world famous eons ago. In its chemical structure it closely resembles the Roberts Syndrome (as in Julia), first identified in “Pretty Woman” and last seen in “Larry Crowne.”

“I Don’t Know How She Does It” is adapted from Allison Pearson’s 2002 novel about a woman who “has it all” (to use that awful 1980s cliché), meaning success in business and a happy family. It’s a matter of juggling, Ms. Parker’s character, Kate Reddy, confides. The secret is not how you catch but how you throw.

Kate is a hotshot manager for a Boston investment company (in the novel the setting is London), whose long-suffering husband, Richard (Greg Kinnear), a struggling, often unemployed architect, becomes a de facto househusband left to bring up their two young children as Kate’s star ascends. Kate boasts that there is still heat between them, but in the minutes between his taking a shower in preparation for a marital tryst and plunking down next to her in bed, she falls fast asleep; so much for heat.

Although the movie is chock-full of smart one-liners, and Ms. Parker’s maniacally giddy Kate wages a full-scale charm offensive, the movie inadvertently makes Kate’s supposedly golden life look like a living hell. During much of the movie she behaves like a rat in a maze, hyperstimulated by constantly buzzing cellphones as she dashes back and forth between Boston and New York to pitch a deal having something to do with retirement funds. As we all know, going to an airport nowadays is about as much fun as a trip to the hospital.

The jittery momentum of the movie, directed by Douglas McGrath (“Emma,”“Infamous”), mirrors Kate’s frazzled state all too well. In one of its more clever touches, the film visualizes Kate’s endless things-to-do list that gives her insomnia as an animated scrawl.

Ms. Parker is a reasonably adept physical comedian, and a scene in which Kate, having just learned that her children have lice, frantically scratches her head during a high-powered meeting gives the movie a momentary blip of levity. But more often than not, Ms. Parker’s straining to be funny comes across as desperation to please.

With two exceptions, the supporting roles are underwritten and the performances anemic. Mr. Kinnear’s Richard is a near-cipher who reacts to Kate’s hysteria with mild exasperation, only raising his voice once (and not very loud). Pierce Brosnan, suave as ever but grayer, plays Jack Abelhammer, the company’s head honcho in New York with whom Kate teams to pitch the deal. A calm, enlightened, impossibly courtly, unattached widower who tolerates Kate’s every quirk and begins to fall in love with her, he is the polar opposite of a driven financial kingpin like Richard Fuld, the final former chief executive of Lehman Brothers. The screenplay by Aline Brosh McKenna (“The Devil Wears Prada,”“27 Dresses”) makes a whole to-do about the signals conveyed by Jack’s signing his e-mails to Kate “xo.”

The movie is unkind to Kate’s perceived rivals, both male and female. The head of her Boston office, Clark Cooper (Kelsey Grammer), is a supercilious iceberg; her colleague Chris Bunce (Seth Meyers), a treacherous, grinning back stabber. But neither has enough screen time to register as more than a half-finished sketch. The film is nastier to two Boston matrons, nicknamed “the Momsters,” one of whom blithely dispenses anti-Kate barbs while working on an elliptical trainer.

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Kate’s best friend, Allison (Christina Hendricks), who speaks directly to the camera, has more substance, although her remarks about the different perceptions of similar male and female behavior in the workplace are about as fresh as “Have a nice day” and “Where’s the beef?”

The movie’s one unalloyed delight is Olivia Munn’s portrayal of Kate’s poker-faced assistant, Momo, a spiritual first cousin of Anna Kendrick’s Natalie Keener in “Up in the Air,” but icier and more robotic. Beneath Momo’s composure lurks a terror that leaks out when she learns she is pregnant.

Carrie Bradshaw flirted her way into mass consciousness in the late ’90s, when Ms. Parker was in her early 30s, and well before Sept. 11, two wars and a major recession dampened American exuberance. If Kate’s hyperkinetic cheer and shrill self-absorption are Carrie trademarks, 13 years after “Sex and the City” first appeared on television, their appeal has all but evaporated. “I Don’t Know How She Does It” seems stuck in the past. Except for one acid remark about bankers, the screenplay seems to imagine that the boom years are still upon us.

More than once, a character exclaims, “Let’s make some money!” But there’s no indication that all the wealth pouring down is producing any joy or pleasure, beyond the grim satisfaction of beating the competition and getting the deal done.

“I Don’t Know How She Does It” is rated PG-13 (Parents strongly cautioned). It has mild sexual situations.

I DON’T KNOW HOW SHE DOES IT

Opens on Friday nationwide.

Directed by Douglas McGrath; written by Aline Brosh McKenna, based on the novel by Allison Pearson; director of photography, Stuart Dryburgh; edited by Camilla Toniolo and Kevin Tent; music by Aaron Zigman; production design by Santo Loquasto; costumes by Renée Ehrlich Kalfus; produced by Donna Gigliotti; released by the Weinstein Company. Running time: 1 hour 30 minutes.

A version of this review appears in print on September 16, 2011, on Page C6 of the New York edition with the headline: Even a Things-to-Do List Seems to Be Multitasking. Order Reprints|Today's Paper|Subscribe